Year 9, Day 133: Ezekiel 7

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Two things leap out at me as I read Ezekiel 7: violence and pestilence.  Certainly, there is more to this chapter than that.  We have proclamation after proclamation of God’s judgment.  We have promise of destruction.  But above it all rises violence and pestilence.

The theme of violence is interesting because t comes alongside the studies of the past few chapters.  Human bring about their on downfall through pride as we walk away from God.  Humans bring about their on downfall when we worship things other than God and His truth.  The natural conclusion of our own pride and denial of the truth is violence.  We turn to violence as we learn to care more about ourselves than others and seek our own passions.

God allows us to suffer the consequences of our own desires.  When we make choices, He will allow us to stray down the path of self-destruction.  He will allow us to pursue our own violence.  He would rather we choose peace and relationship, but our free will mandates we have the right to pursue violence if we want it bad enough.

For me, though, pestilence is the greater academic pursuit within this chapter.  For several chapters pestilence has been tied to the violence of the sword.  In Ezekiel 7 we get pestilence fleshed out.  After all, those in the field will die violently while those who hide in the protective confines of the city will die through pestilence.

I love the lesson that this teaches.  So often we think that we can build walls to keep us safe.  So often we think that our walls, if built strongly enough, can prevent us from our own sinfulness.  However, we know that to not be true.  If we built strong enough walls, all we do is choke out life within.  The people of Jerusalem may have been spared the sword of the Assyrians and somewhat soared from the Babylonians, but instead they had to face starvation, thirst, cannibalism, and treachery as people fought to stay alive.

What’s worse, suffering the immediate consequence of our sin or being eaten alive by our sinfulness from the inside out?  That is the deep question that the concept of pestilence brings into view.

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